aabicus – Page 16 – The Daily SPUF

Why Apex Legends is the Best Battle Royale

February 10, 2019February 9, 2019 aabicus 0 Comments apex legends, comparison, design, Fortnite, playerunknown's battlegrounds, pubg, release

I previously covered PUBG and Fortnite on this channel, and you may have noticed neither of them stuck around for very long because I just couldn’t get into them. To be honest, I’ve never been a fan of the Battle Royale genre in general, but Apex Legends is seriously the first Battle Royale game that I’m finding legitimately fun on its own merits and I’m amazed that I can’t wait to start playing it even from the moment I’ve turned it off for the night. The developers have looked at all the things that usually make Battle Royales boring and… [Continue Reading]

Featured The SPUF of Legend

The 5 Most Influential Half-Life Mods

February 1, 2019February 1, 2019 aabicus 0 Comments half life, halflife, mods, spuf of legend, sven co-op

Half-Life was a great game, had a huge impact on the shooter genre and everybody who grew up back then loved this game, myself included. Valve did a decent job of releasing new content for us all to play, such as Blue Shift and Opposing Force, but the real heroes were the modders who filled the voids with hundreds of standalone fangames of every conceivable length and quality. A few of them are super famous, and if it made this list, it’s because I think you should go play it. Quick Disclaimer: This list is only interested in mods, not… [Continue Reading]

Featured

Overwatch’s Brigitte

January 28, 2019January 27, 2019 aabicus 0 Comments brigitte, overwatch

On March 20 2018, Blizzard added Brigitte to Overwatch. For the next year and a half, they nerfed her eight times and never buffed her once. I think that’s a pretty clear indicator of how horrendously she was broken on launch. The problem wasn’t that she could do everything. I mean, she could, but most of the supports are pretty versatile in this game. So what if she had a shield to block damage, a flail to deal damage at any range without reloading, a healing method that let her heal at close or long-range and convert extra healing into armor? All of… [Continue Reading]

Featured

Overwatch’s Moira

January 25, 2019January 23, 2019 aabicus 0 Comments moira, overwatch

While I still consider myself a Lucio main, I’ve found myself playing a lot of Moira for the last year or so. It’s been a long time since I’ve written an article dedicated to an Overwatch hero, but I think the time is ripe to give my thoughts on the most versatile healer in Overwatch. Support mains are spoiled rotten in Overwatch. Blizzard has given us so many exciting heroes, all with their own methods for keeping the team healed, but none of them have quite so many different ways to heal as Moira. She can tag nearby teammates with healing spray, tag faraway… [Continue Reading]

Featured Now for Something Completely Different

General Strike: A Monopoly Full-Conversion Mod

December 28, 2018April 8, 2022 aabicus 2 Comments board game, board games, mod, monopoly

The next generation of Game Development Master’s students have started their program (I graduated!) and one of their first assignments is to make a mod for a pre-existing board game. I didn’t get this assignment in my year, but I happened to have already made one back when I was in high school, and the professor asked that I upload it somewhere so he could use it an example. On that note, hi everybody from UCSC Games & Playable Media class of 2020! General Strike A Monopoly game for two to four players General Strike is a board game played on… [Continue Reading]

Featured

aabicus at College: A Conclusion

December 24, 2018January 2, 2019 aabicus 0 Comments college, design, real life, recap, spuf of legend

About a year ago, I wrote an article discussing my first quarter of my Master’s Program. I’d ended that article saying that first quarter was expected to be the busiest, but honestly each one had more work than the last. Not a complaint, mind you, but it turns out it’s not easy cramming two years of work into a single year. That article ended with me becoming Creative Director for a healing-based puzzle shooter called Medical Necessity, and that project took up the lion’s share of the following (winter) quarter. You can read about the progress we made by checking out… [Continue Reading]

Featured

Rhydon: A Tarnished Past and a Troubled Future

December 15, 2018December 13, 2018 aabicus 2 Comments criticism, pokemon, pokemon go, sinnoh stone sucks

When I first started Pokemon GO, I committed myself to only owning one of each type of Pokemon (not counting my traveling Rattata collection). The game was so stingy with storage space I knew I needed to do something to prevent myself from becoming a hoarder. Plus it gives my Pokemon more of an identity and forces me to use more interesting battle squads than just 6 Mewtwos or Machamps. This means that my Rhydon was far and away my most valuable Pokemon in the early months of the game. Rhyhorns were everywhere in my hometown, so he was the first Pokemon I… [Continue Reading]

Featured

Building the Best Gym Attackers in Pokemon GO

December 13, 2018December 10, 2018 aabicus 0 Comments guide, pokemon, pokemon go

Pokemon GO is experiencing a booming renaissance after Niantic added several awesome features that augment the core gameplay. The research quest mechanic gives players constant goals beyond simply catching Pokemon, and the new Adventure sync system that links Pokemon Go’s progress with your fitness app of choice is encouraging players to use the app to get fit. The slow rollout of Gen IV and the imminent PvP mode is creating all sorts of buzz. But its also bringing in a lot of players who don’t know the core elements of Pokemon GO‘s battling system. It’s pretty easy from a surface look, but… [Continue Reading]

Featured The SPUF of Legend

The 5 Best Pistols in Payday 2

December 10, 2018December 7, 2018 aabicus 0 Comments advice, list, payday 2, pistol, spuf of legend, weapons

As your starter secondary of choice and the cornerstone of the Fugitive skill trees, pistols are one of the core weapon categories in Payday 2. How do you choose which pistol is the best? Well, everyone will have a different list, but here’s mine! Number 1 – The best all-around pistol is the Baby Deagle, it’s got the damage output of the magnums with the concealment, firing speeds and versatility of the smaller caliber options. If you don’t have the Ultimate edition, the White Streak is a base game option that only suffers from fewer available mods Number 2 –… [Continue Reading]

Featured

Building Proper Gym Defenders in Pokemon GO

December 7, 2018December 10, 2018 aabicus 0 Comments guide, pokemon, pokemon go

As you play Pokemon GO, you’ll quickly accrue a sizeable army of tried-and-true battlers to help you take on even the most stalwart of gyms and fearsome of raids (and soon, rival trainers!) But most of those Pokemon unfortunately will not make good gym defenders. A gym defender has an impossible task assigned to them. Even at top motivation, any attacking Pokemon will have a massive advantage going into a fight. Even worse, they likely will not be at top motivation, which only makes their chances bleaker. This makes it all the more important that you select the best possible… [Continue Reading]